Day 8 - Grave Encounters (2011)

Honestly I'm not entirely sure how I felt about the Viscious Brothers first film, Grave Encounters (2011). This is one of those movies that, after the first half, requires an almost complete suspension of disbelief just to stay with it. Not saying that this is necessarily a bad thing, only that GE does go a bit over the top through the latter half of the film. Starting off simply enough as a found footage film, with promise to revial Paranormal Activity, the movie soon degenerates into explosive, Boo!-type scares rather than the more creeping and subtle tactics of other such movies. Though GE does start off using more subtle scares, around the halfway mark the entire tone of the story changes, taking a strange, almost Twilight Zone-esque twist.

Grave Encounters is a found footage film based on the premise that it is in fact an early stages paranormal reatlity show, in the vein of Ghost Hunters, Ghost Adventures, or even MTV's Fear, and that the film itself is the footage retrieved from the show's sixth episode. In this episode of the show the five man crew was meant to spend the night locked in a haunted asylum. This early portion of the film is rendered with complete believability. The fist forty-five minutes are marked by a slow build with those few spooky elements that you would expect from such a movie, and though the bulk of the film is done with handcams, there are stillcam shots to break it up. As I said before, once things in the movie really take off any notion of subtlety goes right out the window. This has a definite House on Haunted Hill (1999) vibe in the later portions of the story, as the film crew realize that they truly are trapped in the asylum. Since this film works primarily on shock scares, and not wanting to give too much away, I won't say anymore.

Frankly, Grave Encounters is both enjoyable and completely unbelievable, like a first person walk through of the most elaborate haunted house you can imagine. Not having seen a trailer for this film before hand, as I understand it, the trailer gives a lot away. So if you want to get the full effect of the film, turn out the lights, get comfy, and dive right in.

Tomorrow I will be reviewing Piranah (2010).